The Simple Facts of Life are Such
by saoulbete
Summary: "Of all the gin joints in all the towns, huh? You know your life isn't a movie, Rizzoli, right?" "Well, it sure feels like a bad soap opera."
1. Chapter 1

A/N - I'm a little torn on this one. There is more of this written, but I'm not quite sure if I want to actually continue it or not, it's just right now a few paragraph sketches of what could happen. Part of me likes leaving this on this sort of hopeful note that this will be the kick in the pants that Jane needs to finally just get over herself and let the reader imagine a happy ending after this, because honestly, I'm torn as to what I want to have happen with this. Really, I just wanted to write some Jane/Frost banter, while watching Casablanca for the zillionth time. And was not in the mood to write more fluff for The Rizzoli Kid, so I wound up with this.

* * *

"You alright there, partner?" She looked up from where she was staring at her beer bottle, slowly picking at the label, frowning up at the Dodgers-Padres game, surprised to find that they were already in the 7th.

"Fine." She muttered, looking back up at Frost, before turning her attention back to the label of her beer bottle, pausing in the path to glance at the booth in the corner where Maura sat. With Ian. Ian Faulkner, who decided to magically reappear from whatever third world hellhole he'd been to last.

"Of all the gin joints in all the towns, huh?" She rolled her eyes at Frost, taking another long swig of her beer.

"I dunno, this place could use the gambling room in the back. Might make it more enjoyable than watching this." The beer bottle pointed at the TV. Her gaze was pointed on Maura. Her partner said nothing, merely smirked.

"You really don't like that bastard, do you?"

"No. That's the worst part. He's not a bad guy. He's doing a good thing. He risks himself to save others. I know I sure as hell would never go to some godforsaken hellhole from some Feed the Children ad country. Feels like I'm hating the pope or something."

"Yeah, but it's like, the Doc hears that he's in town, and all of a sudden you're swiss cheese."

"So nice of you to have noticed." She rolled her eyes, returning back to the label of her beer bottle, peeling it off in long, slow strips.

"You still haven't told her, have you?"

"Hell no."

"Why not?" She raised her eyebrow at her partner, her entire body language screaming the unspoken _really?_

"Yeah, right. Just walk up to your best friend and go _hey, this fucked up not-really-a-relationship thing we have? It should become a real thing._ Not exactly the sort of conversation you jump right into between talking about the weather and how the Sox are doing."

"You ever consider that she thinks you don't actually y'know-"

"How could she _not_ know? Jesus, Frost, I'm like, captain fucking obvious here. Fuck, that blind CI you have can see it."

"Mr. Magoo?"

"Yeah, him. _He_ could see that I'm-"

"You've got it bad?"

"Yeah. That."

"You're a woman. You know how this shit goes. You don't _tell_ em, they psyche themselves out." She rolled her eyes at her partner's limited understanding of women.

"We do not psyche ourselves out just because – look, she knows damn well how I feel. She knows all she has to do is say she feels it too, and it'll happen." She took a long gulp of her beer, flagging down Murray to fetch her another.

"Maybe she's too shy to make the first move." She stared at Frost, wondering where the hell he had gotten that sort of an idea.

"Is this the same Maura Isles we're talking about? Queen of oversharing? Maura and_ shy_ go together about as well as Vanilla Ice and _good music." _

"Face it, Jane, you're not the easiest person to read."

"I'm like Dr. Seuss to her."

"How do you know she doesn't think you friendzone'd her? I mean, you two have been dancing around this shit for almost a decade." She rolled her eyes. Was her partner _really_ that much of an idiot?

"First of all, the friend zone is definitely a man-made thing, and totally isn't an actual _thing_. Second of all, once a week. I leave her an opening at least once a fucking week, and she finds some way of dismissing all of them without making me feel like an idiot. I'd be in awe of it if it didn't involve _us_." There some sort of complicated hand gesture that those who had spent years reading the body language of the wild _J. Rizzolius _would recognize as a gesture of utter frustration. "Seriously. It's like, she's the master of making people think they still have a chance. Never actually shooting you down, but at the same time, like, sidestepping it. Hell, I thought we were actually starting to make progress here-"

"And then he showed back up." She nodded, starting in on the label of her second beer. Or was it third? Didn't matter.

"It's like he comes back, and he's all y'know, her first true love, and how the fuck can you compete with that? It's like fairy tale shit. He just comes back out of nowhere and whisks her off her feet. And it's like every time he comes back, it makes me wonder why I even bother."

"Cause you're not entirely cold-blooded."

"Fuck you, I have a reputation to maintain. Besides there's something that's gotta get homeland security's panties in a bunch with that guy. I mean, other than the whole smuggle medicine into wartorn countries in a relief effort sort of thing. He'll get his, eventually. One of these days he'll wind up in some other third world hellhole, this time courtesy of the feds."

"So you're not only a sentalmentalist, but now you're becoming a patriot? Nice, Jane, nice." She slugged her partner in his arm, waving down for another round of beers, wondering how it was that the Dodgers and the Padres managed to drag things into extra innings.

"Look, why are we even still talking about this? Did you see Brady during Sunday's game? I mean, it's only preseason, but damn, he _still_ doesn't look the same since he fucked his leg up, what three seasons ago?"

"Four, and you know I'm a Steelers fan, right?" She made a look of mock disgust.

"We will convert you."

"Something in the dirty water, right? Just forces everyone to give up the allegiances. No way. Black and yellow all the way for this guy." She cringed in secondhand embarrassment as she watched Frost launch into full wannabe rapper mode. "You know what it is, everything I do I do it big-"

"Wiz Khalifa you ain't, Frost." He turned to her, impressed at her pop culture knowledge.

"I don't know, what do you think, put me in a hat-" He was purposely mugging as he dragged up a picture of the artist in question and she just laughed, giving him a playful shove. She frowned as she watched the walkoff homer ending the game and her entire reason for being at the bar. She drained what was left of her beer and looked at Frost. "See you tomorrow Rizzoli?"

"I'm like a bad case of crotch-rot, can't just wash me away." She laughed at Frost's pinched look at her rather grusome turn of phrase.

"Yeah, yeah, you and Korsak, all the usual suspects."

"Hey, we're far from usual!"

* * *

"Hey, partner, what are you doing down here?" She was slumped against one of the chairs in the morgue office, fingering a knight, toying with it before moving it forward, looking at the board from the opposite point of view without ever moving from her seat.

"It was this or play solitaire at my desk. At least here I don't have to wait on the elevator for the tox results."

"I always pegged you as more of a Freecell sort of girl." She shook her head, moving an opposing bishop and looking back at the pieces on her side of the board. Frost sat down across from her, but made no move to interrupt her chess match against herself. "Minesweeper? Hearts?"

"I can kick you ass in all of them, but I like chess. Makes you think."

"Gives you a distraction, you mean." She looked up from the board long enough to glare at him, before making another move. "She's not here, is she?"

"Out to dinner. Three guesses as to who she's with." She frowned as she realized that she had left an opening. If she was _any_ good at this game, she would have wound up in a draw against herself. A few bleating notes of Dooley Wilson drawled out and she glared across the room at Frost who was hurriedly texting a reply. "When did you pick up _that_ ringtone?"

"What? It's a classic."

"Classic my ass."

"Hey, it's like, one of the most covered songs on the planet."

"So's Paint it Black by the Stones. Doesn't mean it's timeless."

"Hey, just because _you're_ pissed that the love of your life is out to _dinner-"_ She kicked him under the table for the use of air quotes, "With some other dude doesn't mean you need to take it out on good music."

"She's not-" She didn't even bother dignifying the sentence by finishing it.

"Why do you just refuse to admit it? Just tell her already, save all of us the trouble."

"Right. Because that's such an easy conversation to have. Been over this already, Frost. Besides, what happens when _he_ comes back again? Drops back in from whatever Red Cross Relief Mission he's been on and sweeps her off her feet again? Every single time he comes back, it's all _oh I thought I'd never see you again_ and when she does, she can't keep away. I'm not an idiot, Frost. He's not entirely out of her life, he just chooses when to make his cameos." She cursed as she realized that she left a perfect opening in the black defense for a bishop to snake in and poach the queen. She really should be better against herself than she was.

"You really think she'd pick him over you?"

"He had first dibs."

"And you snooze, you lose. He's the one that's come back and left how many times now?"

"This makes three, as long as I've known her."

"And yet she always stays here."

"And how do I know that this time's not gonna be the charm?" She never took her eyes off the board, moving pieces around almost mechanically. Frost was right, this was a good distraction.

"So what, you think this is going to be it, and she's going to fly back to god-knows-where with him? Where they don't even have the electricity, much less the internet for her to keep up with that shoe fetish?" Her scowl deepened.

"Tell that to your ringtone." She muttered as the song in question played the same fifteen second loop.

"You think she's going to stand you up on a five o'clock train for him? Life ain't a movie, you know that, right Rizzoli?"

"No, mine's a terrible soap opera." She frowned as she tried to find anyway to back her way out of the threatening checkmate she'd pinned herself in. She looked up briefly as one of the interns handed her the tox results on their victim. Her scowl deepened as she realized that there was definitely no way out of the pin she had going on the king, and tipped the piece over in resigned defeat.

"Right, well if this is a soap opera, let's just cut to the mid season hiatus, and get back to the case. I'm sure it's a better distraction than losing to yourself at chess." She grinned, handing over the file as she stood up.

"Barry, I have the feeling this is going to be the start of a beautiful friendship." She slung a friendly arm around his shoulders as they walked out, trying to track down who was responsible for yet another murder.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N I kinda didn't want to go here, but...I did. I just have not been in the sort of mood to write happy and fluffy (I blame winter) but do have most of the next chapter of The Rizzoli Kid written, and *had* the next chapter of Peal of Distant Thunder written til my laptop hardrive shit out on me. But I did find this, the few paragraphs I had sketched out when I swapped in the HD from my old lappy. And it caught my eye, and I finished it. I warned if it continued it would be angsty, and well, it is.

* * *

"I know why you're here, and I'm not gonna do it." The words catch Maura off guard as she steps inside the apartment, taking the offered glass of wine, not even commenting on the fact that there was one already prepared and waiting. She's been waiting for this, known it was coming all day.

"Do what?" She sat herself back down on the couch, unpausing the movie, focusing her gaze on Bogie and Bergman rather than the woman next to her.

"What you came here for." There's a genuinely confused look on Maura's face and she would think it adorable. If it wasn't for the reason it has well-sculpted eyebrows furrowing. She knows Maura honestly didn't realize the reason for the visit. But she knows. She knows full well why Maura is here, what Maura had come here searching for.

"I only came here to talk. Why do you think I'm here?" The light catches on diamond and gold, a spot of glare bouncing off the television, and the fact that the ring catches the light when Maura moves to take a drink is telling. An answer of indecision, not a refusal, but not an acceptance, a consideration, a calculation.

She takes a long gulp of her beer, soaking in the effortless charm of Peter Lorre. That someone so unattractive could be so entrancing - she envied his charisma."You know, its a shame him and Christopher Walken never got to act together. They woulda been awesome. Aweomely creepy, but awesome." She's speaking more to fill the silence than to make conversation.

"I haven't said yes." She can see the glimmering point of glare bouncing around, and she doesn't need to look over to know what Maura looks like at that moment. Head down, honey colored tresses falling like a curtain - parted, open for now but ready to be drawn and block out the world. staring as a perfectly manicured left thumb and forefinger toy and twirl the new addition to the right hand.

"And you haven't said no." It hangs heavily between them, but she is not going to cave, simply keeps her gaze steady on the television. She refuses to look to the side, refuses to take in the brilliant blue dress that has long since been etched into her mind. She wonders if Maura even realizes that it was the dress that made her realize for the first time what it was like to be in love. She hasn't seen this dress in a while, and she thought for sure it had disappeared forever from the woman's wardrobe. And she can't help but wonder if its being worn on purpose.

"I have a life here. I have a career. Obligations. Friends." She nods, not breaking her gaze away from a man's horrible realization that everything he had known was a lie as he stood waiting for the five o'clock train.

"Yep."

"Jane -"

"Already told you, not gonna do it." She simply takes another long sip of her beer.

"Do _what?_" The exasperation is evident.

"I never understood why the owner of the Blue Parrot couldn't recognize a lost cause. Its obvious Sam was never going to leave Rick's. I mean, they're both ex-pats, they're old friends, why would anyone think a job could get in the way of that." Thereass a long pause between them, the tension thick enough to be palpable.

"I never liked this movie."

"What, not scientific enough for you?"

"I don't like Paul Henreid." She shrugs, focusing back on the movie. "Ian's flight leaves in two days." She knows what the unasked, unmentioned other part of that sentence is. She knows that there is another ticket booked in the seat next to it. Whether or not it will be filled with a warm body or simply used to keep a laptop bag out of an overhead bin is still up in the air.

She snorts at the unintentional pun, refusing to pay any mind to it as the look of confusion deepens.

"Yep."

"Jane -"

"Not. Gonna. Do. It."

"What!? What is it that you thought I came here for? What is it that you are so steadfastly refusing to do?" She finally breaks her eyes away from the TV, seeing Maura with tears welling in hazel eyes, looking lost, and pitiable, and she takes a long gulp of her beer, finishing it off, glad for the excuse to get up, head for the kitchen.

"Not thought. I _know_ why you're here. You came here so you can have an excuse. For me tell you not to go. Tell you that I need you. That going off and marrying him is going to break me because I love you that damn much. And I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to be the handy-dandy reason you trot out whenever someone asks you why you're still in Boston and not off globe trotting. I'm not going to be the excuse you have, your damn rationalization to yourself, when you wonder if you've fucked up." She saw the confusion ebb away to anguish. There's still that lost, pitiable look, and she stands her ground in the kitchen, afraid that if she moves even an inch closer the urge to wrap Maura in her arms and never let go would be too impossible to resist. "He's a good guy. What he does, its real respectable work. There are people out there that need the two of you."

"So this is it then? You're really going to -" She shrugs.

"Look, Maur, I'm still your friend here. You wanna marry him, I'll stand up there next to you and sign the register like a good maid of honor. Hell, I'll even wear a dress, plan the bachelorette party, help you with all the planning, call you out when you're going all bridezilla. I'll still be here to talk, or text, or skype, or whatever, still willing to grab lunch if you're ever back in town. Hell, I've always wanted to go on a safari and lord knows I got enough vacation days banked. I've got your back, and it doesn't matter if that back is Dr. Maura Isles, or Maura Faulkner or Maura Jingleheimer-Schmidt. That's never going to change."

"That's it?" She could see a spark of anger flashing behind the pain. "After everything, you're not even going to say anything about this? About what we have?"

"That's cause we don't _have_ anything. You had your chance. I know you know how I feel. I gave you every opportunity to turn this fucked up thing that was never really just friends into something real. You passed that up." She slams the bottle down on the edge of the counter, watching as the top hit the ceiling with the force with which it was violently freed before clattering to the floor.

"I passed it up? You're the one that whenever a conversation would go anywhere near the topic of relationships, sex, anything involving intimacy in general, would go running away."

"And you never once brought up any of those things about _us_. There never was an _us_. I gave you so many openings. So many times to just jump in and change that. And you never did."

"Neither did you!" She was aware of Maura standing in front of her, so close that she could feel the hair on the back of heck, her arms, everywhere, prickling and standing on edge. Part of her wants to ask Maura why humans still had this reflex, when even an appendix had more use. Most of her wants to. To be able to fall back on whatever it was they used to be. When they were able to skirt the edges of something more, and think that they had all the time in the world to give in to what seemed unavoidable.

"Look, you want to go off and marry Ian, go marry him. Go have the perfect little life being the perfect little wife in Africa helping sick kids. I'm not going to stop you. I'm not going to stand here and say I'm better than he is, because I'm not."

"How can you say that? You - you're ever bit as wonderful as he is. You put your life at risk every day to protect innocent people. You care so deeply for the people in your life. You are a wonderful person."

"Yeah. I am. But I'm not _better_ than he is. We're apples and oranges." They are standing there, staring at each other, and she can see the torment and the anguish plainly erched in hazel, and she's feeling it too, even if she's putting all her years of learning how to hide her emotions to use. She's spent all day preparing for this, she's known it was going to happen since she first caught sight of the ring this morning at work. She's not going to break down now.

"If you think you're being noble, self-sacrificing -" She gives a bitter bark of laughter.

"No, I'm doing this because I have some self-respect."

"And what is that supposed to mean?"

"I know why you came here tonight. I know why you've been avoiding me ever since Ian proposed. And you know what? Yeah, I love you, but I'd rather see you married to him and halfway around the world than be the easy option." She can see the confusion well up again, and part of her hates that Maura is so innocent to not even realize why they are standing here, talking in surprisingly calm tones. "Look, our chance to be something more is over. You should go, be happy with him. I'm happy for you if you're happy with him. Since _this_ is never going to happen, I'm not going to stand in the way of true love."

"Our chance...is over?" She hates, utterly despises the confused, disbelieving tone in Maura's voice.

"Yeah. Yeah it is. Whatever it was we coulda been, well, its just that. Coulda, woulda, shoulda. Not gonna happen. Ship has sailed, book's closed, however you wanna put it, we missed the opportunity."

"Jane - I -" The pain is damn near tangible and she takes a deep breath. She's spent all day preparing for this. She will not give in. "You don't want me?" God, that voice, that pitiful little squeak, its trying her last nerve.

"No." She says, glad that her voice stays calm. "Not anymore. Maybe, once, yeah. Once, I woulda given my left tit for the chance to turn our whatever the hell it was into a real, proper relationship. But not now. Not like this."

"What changed?" She feels her eyes widen and her brows shoot up. What changed? Did Maura really need to ask that? Did the woman really not get it? Some genius.

"Why are you doing this now? Why am I suddenly an option when the last two years every time I'd do something that could have led to something more, you've sidestepped it? Why is it that all of a sudden you're interested?"

"Jane I - I was never _not/ interested. I always wanted this."_

"Forgive me if I have difficulty believing you. After you, you know, found every way possible to turn me down without actually turning me down."

"I wasn't turning down the offer, merely - delaying it. I was waiting."

"For what? The end of the world?"

"That day, in the precinct, with Marino. I knew I loved you from that day. That's why I didn't come to see you often during your recovery. I couldn't handle seeing you, wanting you, and not being able to do anything. And I started thinking. Our lives? What we do? We never know what is going to happen to us. And we - this - it felt like an inevitability. I knew that when we finally gave in to this that it would be it for me."

"It?" She questioned, wanting to confirm that she was hearing this correctly.

"I - knew that once I was with you I wouldn't - And I wanted - I'm a scienist. Wanted to see the results of the same expiriment with different variables before proving my hypothesis true." She wasn't quite sure what the emotion that was bubbling up inside of her was. But it was dark, and it was ugly and she would have been quote content to never have felt it in her life.

"This whole thing - it was just a damned expiriment to you? All these years, all this standing aside and watching you flounce around with the boyfriend of the week, it was just a fucking science project? Well guess what, you've won the blue ribbon with this one." She took a larger gulp of rapidly warming beer than was strictly necessary, slamming the bottle on the counter.

"Jane, I didn't - I don't -" there was a long pause between them, the tension palpable. "I'm making a mess of things."

"Ya think?" She sees the tears start to fall, and the part of her that moments ago swore that she'd still be a good friend no matter what shoves a tissue in a well-manicured hand.

"I just - I hadn't thought Ian would return. And I thought if he did, I would know instantly what my choice was. But it's not that simple."

"It never is."

"I never thought of you, of my feelings for you as some sort of expirement. I just - I - I love Ian. But even when I am with him, as heady and intoxicating as it is, I've never had him in my house and have it feel like things are the way they're supposed to be when he's there." She shakes her head.

"Save yourself the breath, Maur. You had your chance. You had every opportunity. You're the one that decided to keep putting us on the backburner, and now, now -" She can't even think of how to finish that sentence. She just knows that she can't do this.

"What changed? Why - I don't understand why when I'm coming to you saying that I don't want that anymore, that I'm done evading and delaying, you're rebuffing me."

"You really don't get it?" At the sad shake of blonde waves she sighs, draining the rest of her beer in long gulps. "Look, I can't be with you now, after this, because of _that._" She nodded at the ring wrapped around a right hand.

"But I haven-"

"I know. But that's - if we did this now, I'm never going to know if you picked me because you really love me more, or because you like change less." The confused look of anguish is back again. "You said it yourself. You have a career here, obligations. You have a life here, and if we - I'd never know if you were with me because you wanted me, or because picking me means that you don't have to leave that."

"Jane - how can you say that?"

"Because I'm pretty sure you can't lie, but you can trick yourself into thinking its the truth. _You_ may not think you're picking me out of convience, but I'm not going to do that to myself. I'm not going to listen to you say twenty years from now that the reason you didn't go do the romantic thing and run away with him was because of me. I'm not going to be your excuse. I'm telling you to go with him if you love him because I'm not going to be your plan B. I'm no longer the _well I guess I'm all out of other options, time to default to Jane._ The flight leaves in two days. Let me know when to pick you up to take you to the airport. I'm sure Bass'll be happy as a tortoise can be to return to his homeland." She is surprised at how even her tone is. There's no anger, no hurt, and she'll honestly not even feeling such. She's simply - resigned. She's been thinking about this all day, has come to terms with it, has known that she can't do this, not anymore.

She can hear the sounds of a prop plane coming through her television and fights down the bitter chuckle at the timing. "Jane I - I'm sorry. I never meant for you to be my fall-back option. I never wanted you to be that. I was just so afraid of once I committed to you that I - I - I'm sorry. I didn't want this to ever happen. Having to choose between Ian and you -"

"There is no choice. I'm telling you right now, you can stay if you really don't want to leave with him. But even if you do, we're not going to ever be more than friends. And friends are friends no matter where they are in the world."

"Why is this so difficult? Why couldn'r life be like fiction where everything works out and everyone gets a happy ending?" She gives a sad smile, handing her friend another tissue.

"Because the problems of three small people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. And I can't say if you're going to regret it if you don't get on that plane with him. I can't say if you'll regret it tomorrow or the next day or soon, or ever. But if this is something that will make you happy. You deserve that. You deserve happiness."

"Jane -" She can hear the unspoken rebuttals there. The _I can be happy with you. _The placating, desperate sentence that she knows has some meaning. She knows that even if Maura would choose to stay, that the woman would honestly believe that it was out of love, and not out of a desire to not upend a life that was neatly settled into. "I wish this turned out differently." She nods, for once this evening in full agreement.

"So do I, Maur. So do I." She rests her hand awkwardly on a shoulder for a moment, the reality of the evening sinking in, leaving her feeling decidedly hollow. She'd done this. She'd effectively ended the most meaningful relationship in her life. But she'd meant it. Part of her was screaming that even being second-best, being an excuse, a reason to stay would be worth it just to have Maura,but what little rationality she had was reminding her that there would always be that question, that bitter burn of resentment that would seep into every pore and crevice of their relationship, tainting it and staining it. "Let me know when to pick you up to take you to the airport." Maura senses the tone, and stands to leave.

"I'm sorry, Jane." They stand there for a moment, before Maura leans up, gently brushing their lips together. Its soft and bittersweet and speaks of finality and parting. There's nothing to taste but regret and the smoldering ashes of what could have been, dark and smoky and it makes her want to vomit as she flicks her tongue against her lips once they part."Goodbye." She clenches her hands into fists, refusing to wrap her arms around the woman, pull her in close and never let go.

"Bye." She whispers into the empty air once the door swings shut.


End file.
